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A Plethora of Elvises,
A Plenitude of Chers
-- All in Las Vegas

Inpersonators Convention
Abounded in Shanias;
Poor Rodney Dangerfield

By

Jim Carlton Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Updated July 1, 2004 12:01 a.m. ET

LAS VEGAS -- Arnold Schwarzenegger married Shania Twain at a casino here last month, Jack Nicholson gave a motivational speech and Michael Jackson did a moonwalk. Almost nobody recognized Rodney Dangerfield sitting alone on a bar stool.

Then there were the four Elvises, all of them most certainly impostors. But then nearly everyone was a phony at the Imperial Palace Hotel and Casino for the Fourth Annual Celebrity Impersonators Convention held over four days beginning May 30. Knockoffs of the rich and famous gathered for their annual celebration of pseudocelebrity -- about 120 of them here to network, perform for talent scouts, give speeches and generally party down.

George Bush attended, as did Laura Bush, no relation. Cyndi Lauper sat with Roseanne Barr admiring the Elvises performing onstage. There were four Marilyn Monroes, three Chers (one of them a man), and two each of Austin Powers, Michael Jackson and Ozzy Osbourne.

The celebrity doubles came in all shapes and sizes. "I let him take all the tall scenes," said 5-foot-8-inch Sean Connery (impersonator Ted King) of 6-foot Sean Connery (John Allen), "while I get the bedroom parts." And the roster reflected the fluctuating business climate: Shania Twain attendance jumped 300%, to four Shanias this year from one at the conference last year; Britneys were down 80%, to one Britney Spears this year, from five in 2003.

The impostors convention began in 2000 when Elyse Del Francia-Goodwin, an agent for celebrity impersonators, saw a need for industry solidarity that only a confab could provide. Demand for celebrity clones has grown, agents like Ms. Del Francia-Goodwin say, because they add pizzazz to otherwise staid events -- and they don't cost an arm and a leg. It can cost as little as $400 per appearance to hire a fledgling Snoop Dogg (Jermaine Lyons), for instance. "I just think people want a little Hollywood in their lives," says Janna Joos, an Encino, Calif., agent who says the number of her celebrity-impersonator clients has increased to about 1,300, from about 200 15 years ago.

The money some of these fakes can make is very real stuff. The 33-year-old Todd Luxton, one of the show's Elvises, says he grosses more than $200,000 annually playing The King at casinos, fairs and other venues. Mr. Allen, the tall Sean Connery, says an electronics company once flew him to New Zealand, where he impersonated Mr. Connery in a commercial for a new laptop in a rented jumbo jet.

Still, many of the fake famous struggle for recognition of their talent, which is why they flock to this conference. After socializing at a welcoming barbecue this year, the look-alikes sat through a luncheon talk on "Agent Friendly Opportunities."

Then came three hours of lectures. Sitting around tables in the hotel's Fuji conference room with pitchers of ice water, they took in talks with titles including "Where We Fit In" and "Stage Presence." "We shouldn't use the 'N' word: nervous," advised Carmen Miranda (Rosemarie Ballard) in a lecture as a Travis Tritt and other look-alikes scribbled notes. Jack Nicholson (Jack English) delivered a rousing lecture titled "How Attitude Creates Altitude," in which he urged the doubles to stay upbeat.

At the rear of the smoky room, vendor Gary Archer manned his "Dental Prosthetics" booth. Mr. Archer specializes in "braces, gaps and stains" from molds of real celebrities' teeth, he said, for impersonators who "want to go whole hog."

During breaks, hallway conversations turned to shop talk. One group discussed the benefits of portraying someone who is dead. "If they're still alive, you have to let people know you're not that person," said long-deceased Ed Sullivan (Larry Merchison) to one of the Shania clones.

A constant topic in hallway talk surrounded the struggle to be the most genuine fake -- something some of them appear to do better than others. Walking through the Imperial Palace casino one morning, Prince (Alex Curvello) was mobbed by a gaggle of casino guests who thought he really was the Purple One and got him to pose for a photo. From his bar stool, Rodney Dangerfield (Bruce Russell) called out, "Hey, how about a picture with me?" Michele Pate, a tourist from Aberdeen, Wash., replied with a frown: "I don't even know who you are."

Back in the conference room, heads turned as Arnold Schwarzenegger (Lyndall Grant) marched into the room wearing his "Terminator" leather and shades. This was a big day for Mr. Grant, who was set to wed Dianna Paige, a dead-on for country singer Shania Twain, that afternoon in the Imperial Palace Wedding Chapel. The two met and fell in love for real at last year's impersonator show.

"I would spot him across the room and he would spot me," remembered Ms. Paige. "We just attracted each other," added Mr. Grant. That night, the wedding celebrants partied at the "Dinner & Karaoke Showcase," hosted by both of the Austin Powerses.

The highlight of the convention was on day three, when 37 of the performers strutted their stuff on stage in a talent showcase at the Imperial Palace's Legends in Concert showroom. It was a prime opportunity to perform before 50 or so agents and a few dozen curious tourists. The performers had been picked by the show's producers based on who they thought would be most marketable, and there was no time for a formal rehearsal. To combat nervousness, orange-haired Cyndi Lauper (Diana Rice) bopped to the beat of her clone-sake, using headphones to drown out crooner Dean Martin, who preceded her on stage.

Elvises are perennials at the performance, and three of the four who showed up this year made the cut. Seated in the audience, one Elvis, Mr. Luxton, curled his lip in disdain as another Elvis hit a flat note on stage. "On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd have to give that a 5," said Mr. Luxton.

All this fakery was disconcerting to some attendees. "When I see a Jack Nicholson, a Robert De Niro and all these other stars," confided Cordie Lacey, wife of Michael Jackson impersonator C.P. Lacey, "it's kind of freaky."

Freakier still were the bystanders mistaken for impersonators. Deborah Galan, impersonating the late singer Selena, bumped into a dead ringer for Yolanda Saldivar, the crazed fan who was convicted of murdering Selena in real life. Ms. Galan declined to be photographed with the woman, who wasn't an impersonator. "It was too weird," said Ms. Galan.

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